Fictitious Business Name (DBA) needed for an e-commerce site?

MultiplierMultiplier subscriber Posts: 1
edited October 2006 in Building A Website That Works
I`m a new member, so please forgive me if I`m posting in the wrong
forum. I`ve done a lot of searching on the SUN site and the rest of the
Internet, but cannot find an answer to my question:

We are currently waiting for our LLC articles of organization to be
approved by the California Secretary of State. (YAY!!) For sake of this
post, we`ll give it the fictional name, Strategic Climate, LLC.

Once our LLC for Strategic Climate is granted, we will create a
general, information-only website with the domain name
strategicclimate.com.

We would then like to create a couple of different e-commerce websites
to operate under our LLC. These e-commerce websites would have their
own unique domain names, unrelated to the StrategicClimate.com name.
Again, for the sake of this post, we`ll give these fictional e-commerce
sites the following names:

ShadeMe.com
SunResistor.com

We will be accepting credit cards through the ShadeMe.com and
SunResistor.com websites, and plan to advise customers that they will
be billed by Strategic Climate, LLC, and that they should expect to see
Strategic Climate, LLC on their credit card statement. Is this enough?
Do we only have to make mention of Strategic Climate, LLC within each
of the e-commerce websites? Or do we need to register a Fictitious
Business Name (DBA) for ShadeMe.com and SunResistor.com?

Is anyone in the SUN community operating a similar set-up?
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Comments

  • ThinkCanvasThinkCanvas subscriber Posts: 0
    I  am not an expert on this but my company  is Olivia`s Art LLC and we had to register a dba  for our website www.thinkcanvas.com. We also registered another dba for our other website www.framesontherun.com I am in the state of Virginia and laws vary from state to state but  this allows us to use the same credit card processing  services etc for all of them. We would not have been able to do that without the dbagood luck!
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  • truegeniustruegenius subscriber Posts: 3
    As ThinkCanvas said, I`m most certain that you will need to file the DBA names for your other two business entities.  Your LLC can own these, and you can put at the bottom of your web site that the site is owned and operated by XYZ, LLC. This will help clarify that the billing in going under the LLC name.
    We were going to go by a different name for our business and file a DBA for it owned and operated by our LLC.  We`ve decided to go with our LLC name instead so we never filed it.  I think regardless of the state, if you are operating a business under a different name (even your own) you need to file at least a DBA.
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  • NuevolutionNuevolution subscriber Posts: 30 Bronze Level Member
    Multiplier,Yes! you have to file DBA`s for your business Entities. I am a California Corporation and yes, you have to file two different DBA under your LLC. Let me give you my example maybe this will help you. The legal name of my corporation is: Hispanic Marketing Strategies Inc. Under my corporation I have Nuevolution Web Designs and Nuevohost- Business Hosting Solutions as my DBA`s. All this has to be filed with the county registrar for about $70.00 total. The ficticious name filing fee is: $23.00 plus $4.00 for each additional dba for a total of $27.00, the rest goes to your legal advertisement that has to be posted on the Legal Section of the news Paper, I believe for two weeks. Once you have done that you will recieve a ficticious name document that you must put in your Corporations Minutes.. make sure you state in your Minutes that your LLC will be doing business under the assumed name... If you need help, email me I have all the forms.. Also Make sure when you register for a Payment processor that you register it under the LLC and not the DBA.. If you register it under the dba, then it will be hard for you to use it on two different web sites. If you register it under the LLC, then you can use it under any of the shopping carts (this is called a Hirearchy) [hope I spelled it right]... Just make sure that you put something like " Your next billing statement will show a purchase from : "my_LLC" our parent company, or something like that...






    Nuevolution2006-10-5 12:10:44
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  • kkrafts58kkrafts58 subscriber Posts: 12
    O.K. I am confused. What is the purpose of filing the ficticious business name? Right now I am a sole proprietor. I am going to be looking into LLC in the next couple of weeks. Help me out here and give me some guide lines as to starting my business. Yes, I have a website (I will take payments thru paypal) I make gift baskets at home, I have my resale license (seller`s permit) Have not as of yet applied for my Home based business license through the city. I have the paperwork and need to go and file them and I am looking into liability insurance. What all do I need to know and am I missing anything? I`m not doing any outside funding, at this time everything is out of my pocket.
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  • NuevolutionNuevolution subscriber Posts: 30 Bronze Level Member
    Ok what you are missing is,Once you create your LLC, unless you use your LLC`s name to do business under you don`t have to create a fictitious business name filing. So lets say for example you where to use, My Underwater Basket weaving LLC, you don`t have to register as a fictitious name since you are doing business under the LLC`s name. But then there are those that want to create separate divisions under their LLC, for example: My Under Water Basket Weaving may have 2 different DBA`s under the same LLC, Basket Weaving Supplies and My gift Baskets.com, Well, since those are DOING BUSINESS AS names they are considered Fictitious  Business Names. Even if you a sole proprietor  you still have to register your Fictitious  Name Filing unless you are doing business under your own name. You can visit your Local City Hall [in the state you live in] and you can get more information there. or you can goto filedba.com
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  • kkrafts58kkrafts58 subscriber Posts: 12
    Thanks nuevolution, I`ll check it out. Is it better to do a LLC or an s corporation? Any help would be appreciated.
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  • NuevolutionNuevolution subscriber Posts: 30 Bronze Level Member
    KKrafts,I really comes down to what your needs are. If I where you, I would just go with an S Corporation. rather than an LLC, I know allot of people here on the forum like LLC, but like I said, it all depends on your needs.
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  • vwebworldvwebworld subscriber Posts: 40
    The type of business entity you form (C corporation, S corp, partnership,...etc) is an important decision which has tax ramifications.
    When you form a corporation you are creating a separate entity, which has a "life" of its` own.
    There are legal, liability, financial, and tax reasons for the various business forms. You should consult an attorney and or tax accountant to determine what business form is best for your situation (current and future).
    ~Rolandvwebworld2007-5-12 22:50:54
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  • micsimonianmicsimonian subscriber Posts: 1
     
     
     
    micsimonian1/18/2008 6:48 PM
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